If your business cannot generate liquidity for shareholders, it has no value. This article reviews Understanding Your Liquidity Options, one of the main sessions at the Business Transitions Forum in Toronto, which was moderated by our founding partner, Paris Aden.

Liquidity means “readily exchangeable for cash.” Its evil twin illiquidity means “not readily exchangeable for cash without a substantial loss of value.” To picture illiquidity, imagine the NASA crawler, the largest self-powered vehicle in the world. Custom built to move Apollo rockets to the launching pad, the crawler was operated by a team of nearly 30 engineers, technicians and drivers. Although the crawler is valuable, it would be hard to quickly find a willing buyer not named NASA.